Friday, March 15, 2019

7 Quick Takes about Vegan Lies, Playing Rough with Your Kids, and Wearing Blockbuster Slogans on Your Pants Like That Makes Any Sense

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?


Welp. I did it. That's me, with a giant freezer bag full of vegan ground beef substitute.

Always funny, always relatable, always seven. Read this week's 7 Quick Takes for a hilarious recap of the week! #7quicktakes #humor

To be clear, we're not vegan. We're not even vegetarian. I literally just finished eating some pepperonis I was supposed to be putting on a pizza.

We do, however, cook mostly meatless meals. I don't have anything against meat, I just leave it out because it means we have to replace meat with more vegetables, which I think we need.

I try not to be too weird about it, but every now and then I'll make something that seems a little... out there. Phillip always knows when I'm trying a new woo-woo heal the world chakra and meditation crystals recipe because he asks, "What are you making?" and I respond, "I don't want to tell you."

Sometimes it turns out really well, like when we tried these black bean and quinoa veggie burgers topped with mango and avocado that are possibly my favorite food of all time.

And sometimes it turns out... to be this vegan meat substitute. The blogger who wrote the recipe swore up and down that it tastes just like the real thing and even her meat-eating friends swear they can't tell the difference.

Well, she needs to find new friends because her current ones are lying liars.


I have many strengths as a mom. I'm the strict mom who gives her kids a high bar to meet. I'm the productive mom who gets stuff done and teaches her kids to work hard. I'm the mom who's always hunting for new books/apps/podcasts/activities to expand the kids' minds. I'm the mom who serves healthy-ish food. I'm the mom who likes to talk to the kids and help with their problems. I'm the mom who reads with everybody, even the middle- and high-schoolers. But I'm not the fun mom.

Recently I heard about a book called The Art of Roughhousing, and you know me with my parenting book addiction.

I picked it up from the library expecting it to be a kids-need-to-spend-time-outside-climbing-trees kind of book, but it's really a step-by-step guide to being silly with your kids which I actually needed to read way more.



Some of the suggestions in the book look like glorified ways of peeing your pants (see the above pictures and if you've birthed children you'll understand) but at the very least, it's making me think about being more playful with my kids.

I still don't have very much stamina (I get burned out after 6-7 minutes of horseplay whereas the kids are just getting started,) but at least it's resulted in a few more intentional moments of play each day.

And when my 7-year-old walked in the door after school to see me repeatedly punching a couch cushion that her laughing brother was holding in front of his body, the look on her face was totally worth it.


I took my 2-year-old to run an errand at the mall when he pointed to the escalator and said he wanted to ride it. Except he called it an "exeglader."

This is possibly my favorite toddler mispronunciation in 14 years of parenting, and if any of the older kids ever corrects him then they're out of my will.

In related little kid misunderstandings, for months we've had a stack of wood outside for a bonfire at some undetermined point in the future, and I just learned that all this time, my 5-year-old thinks we've been saying "bomb fire."

I corrected that one and he was like, "Oh, okay." But now I'm concerned that he wasn't concerned about a "bomb fire" happening in our yard, whatever that is.


Phillip asked me which of the kids would be interested in going to an extreme BMX/skateboarding/scooter competition he heard about from a friend. So I went to their Facebook page to check it out.

I clicked on this video of some guys doing scooter tricks, and as I watched them whip their scooters around I was part impressed and part like, "Oh, yeah? That's basically me every time I have to drag the kids' scooters back into the garage. I'm surprised I haven't broken an ankle yet."

But still. Not only are these guys skilled, they'll also be amazing at putting their kids' crap away in the garage one day.


It's time for my high schooler to register for next year's classes, and since she's been a little bored I suggested she talk with her guidance counselor about more challenging options.

I ended up going to the meeting, too, just out of curiosity, and I'm glad I did. I would've hated to miss the moment at the end when the counselor asked my daughter "Are you an only child?"

When my daughter answered she had 5 younger siblings, the counselor had to pick her face up off the floor and is probably still trying to make sense of it.

(I guess she assumed that since my daughter was really smart, Phillip and I must have a lot of free time to, I don't know, get up early on the weekends and make her do Russian math drills or something.)


I was walking through the teen boys' section at JC Penney and noticed these sweatpants:

Down the leg, it reads: "be kind, please rewind."

"Be kind, please rewind?" None of the people buying these pants are old enough to even know what that means.

It's worse than when my 12-year-old was telling me about a book she read that made several references to The Simpsons. As she was explaining the plot she stopped herself and said, "Wait, this probably won't make sense to you. Do you know who the Simpsons are?"

DO I KNOW WHO THE SIMPSONS ARE. Child, I've known Bart Simpson longer than I've known you.

I'm getting tired of the teeny-boppers appropriating my culture like this. With every year, I grow dangerously closer to sitting on the front porch full-time yelling at kids to get off my lawn.


For many children, a lullaby from mom or dad is a standard part of the bedtime routine. For my 2-year-old, I threaten to sing if he doesn't settle down and it works almost instantly.

I don't know why he hates it so much. I think I'm an average to above-average singer.

However, every once in a blue moon he requests a song, just to keep me on my toes. The other day he asked me to sing to him at naptime, so I ran through his options: "Do you want The Wheels on the Bus? Twinkle, Twinkle? The Ants Go Marching?"


"I... I don't know any songs about zombies, buddy. How about Baa, Baa, Black Sheep?"

"I want you sing 'bout zombies."

Okaaaaay... After a minute, though, I realized I actually do know a song about zombies. So I sang this to my toddler and he was out like a light by the time I finished.

I just hope he doesn't show this blog post to his therapist someday.

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Laura Pearl said...

Oh my goodness, this is the best post. You are hilarious and put the best spin on all the wonderful craziness of raising kids. Loved every take. I will be back to visit your blog more!!

Laura Pearl said...

And BTW, we had five boys and my husband was always great at roughhousing with them. He'd throw them into the air so that they'd land on the bed (that was called "Sack of potatoes"). He'd wrestle with them on the ground ("Tackle on the 45"). Now that we have grandkids, he's famous for playing "Upside down boy" and "Upside down girl" with all of them. We both think that roughhousing (particularly for boys) is so good and healthy. They love it and they need it! But I think it's so funny that there is a book with illustrations on how to do it! That's awesome!

Rosie said...

Roughhousing is a strictly "dad does this, not mom" activity in our house, solely because of the "pee your pants" potential ;)

Handsfullmom said...

The zombie song is a classic at our house. Right up there with raining tacos and space unicorn.

Kath said...

I have only ever had one fake meat dish that I have liked and I admit I loved it. A friend made fake ground beef with gravy over mashed potatoes. The best part was that she also used the fake (boxed -instant) mashed potatoes which are the only kind I like. Anyway, the whole concoction tasted nothing like actual hamburger gravy but was delicious. Better than the real thing even. So I plan to never try any other fake meat again as I can't take the disappointment. Quitting while ahead as it were...

refabulous said...

EXACTLY what I was going to post.
Love your blog, Jenny!

me said...

Here's a question for you. For your vegan meat substitute - as it was a fail - what do you do with it? Do you make your family eat it anyways? Or do you dispose of the evidence?
I know what camp I'd fall into (I have the palate of a picky 3 year old and i don't make anybody eat anything they think s nasty). However, other parents might be more mature.

Rachel said...

That first diagram from the Art of Roughhousing book looks exactly like a swing dance aerial move I used to do in college when I went dancing every week. Being a mostly girl family, I feel like there was not a whole lot of rough play in my house growing up, although one of my little sisters is most known for stunts like climbing out onto the roof for the fun of it and teaching toddlers how to do "Parkour" around the apartment complex...and has been full-out tackled and made to eat sand on the beach by other sisters after she pushed them off the dock into the lake. Meanwhile, when my 3 year old nephew was asked, "What does Auntie Rachel say?" he responds, "Gentle, gentle!" if you want to know my natural disposition toward roughhousing. haha!

Jenny Evans said...

I just went to your blog and you're pretty hilarious yourself (also, it helps that you appear to have tons of cute grandbabies.) I hope you visit often!

Jenny Evans said...

We have always enjoyed throwing our toddlers on the bed and taking pictures in midair. It's a little silly to have these moves illustrated, but seriously a good concept for a book and the fact that there are so many illustrations makes it a quick and easy-to-browse read.

Jenny Evans said...

If the kids want to learn how to use a pogo stick, they're learning it from each other or dad. That's all I have to say.

Jenny Evans said...

We are well-acquainted with Parry Gripp ourselves.

Jenny Evans said...

I think I might have even liked it if she hadn't gone on and on about how it tasted like real meat. It set me up for disappointment.

I regularly make a meatless biscuits and gravy recipe that I LOVE even more than traditional sausage gravy, but if you ate it expecting it to taste like sausage gravy I think you'd be disappointed no matter how good it is. It's best not to compare the two and just enjoy it for what it is. Maybe this is one of those cases.

Jenny Evans said...

I think I'm just going to slowly sneak it into our food without saying anything since it's still good-for-you vegetables. It just doesn't taste like meat and I think my mistake was thinking/loudly announcing that it would.

Jenny Evans said...

When my second daughter was a preschooler we got her a T-shirt that said, "I do all my own stunts" and it has been passed down to each successive child. It seems more and more appropriate on every one. Some kids are just born like that.

Kimberly Hendrickson said...

All moms have their strengths and weaknesses. I'm a bakes-great-bread mom, a makes-sure-we-read-our-scriptures mom, and a not-afraid-to-squish-creepy-bugs mom, but I am definitely not a plans-cool-birthday-parties mom. Hopefully therapy won't be too expensive.